


heartbeat

by gaytimetraveller



Category: Persona 2
Genre: Angst, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-08
Updated: 2017-04-08
Packaged: 2018-10-16 07:11:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10566228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaytimetraveller/pseuds/gaytimetraveller
Summary: Maya doesn't always fall asleep easy. Unfortunately, nightmares tend to wake you up quickly.





	

**Author's Note:**

> jm not even sure what kind of quality of writing this is but i have had, the weirdest night anxiety wise hoo boy

Maya couldn't sleep. It wasn't the most uncommon thing, especially considering her night owl at best often erratic sleep schedule.

She was content to lay in bed, watching the shadows on the wall, watching the patterns the nightlight she hadn't bothered turning off made. She was almost falling asleep, just not quite there, in a weird in between, the twilight zone of sleep.

Somewhere between one thought and the next, she drifted off, consciousness faintly slipping away. It was a weird feeling, to fall asleep like that. Sleep could be a moment that felt like hours, or days that felt like a minute. Maya wasn't the biggest fan of that part.

Unfortunately, it wasn't long before she snapped back awake, breathing uneven and the worst kind of falling feeling in her gut. She would've bolted straight upright, just like in the movies, if it weren't for the near paralyzing fear that couldn't get her from underneath the covers.

She squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to face whatever truth laid out there, before quickly opening them, thinking that if she felt so much like she was dying she didn't want to die with her eyes closed.

One hand flew up quick to her chest, to feel a heartbeat, but whether she was still half asleep and didn't register it or if it was somehow too faint, she couldn't feel a thing. That only made her stomach drop further. She tried to even out her breathing.

Her other hand not as quickly moved to her side, panicked to check but more afraid of what she might find. Of course, she only felt smooth skin under the old shirt she'd passed out in, it was illogical to think it would be anything else, somehow this didn't even her breathing or ease her growing uneasiness.

There was no wound, no giant gaping hole or spilling blood or ravaging flames despite the shocking pain she was sure she'd felt only moments ago. She tried to reassure herself it was only a nightmare, but it wasn't much comfort. She still couldn't feel a heartbeat.

Now she sat upright, halfway in a frenzy, and the phrase, from that haunting poem she'd always liked, _"worse than dead, forgotten,"_ seemed to echo endlessly and she half wondered if she was still dreaming.

One hand still on her chest, the other scrambled for the switch for the lamp beside her bed. She wondered if dead people knew they were dead. That only made it worse. Somehow her breathing had evened out, that made nothing better.

Still no heartbeat.

Fingers clasped around the switch, and she turned it on, gazing around her half dark room, somewhere between still asleep and in a frenzy. After a few moments her breathing evened out the last ragged edges, and then she hollowly laughed, thinking that of course, how silly, she was _breathing_ that very moment how could her heart be stopped. How could something dead still breathe? (The vague questioning thought of if the dead knew they were dead wandered back in, and she squashed it.)

As she gingerly laid back down in bed, hand still pressed to her chest, thinking only that she should think more positive, she'd been through the worst of hell, and that was all over. Yet she couldn't escape the lingering, small fear that she still couldn't feel a heartbeat.


End file.
